Photogrammetry in the frostbite engine

[seth]

I was just talking to Dr. Spud and I ended up mentioning the new Battlefield 1 beta I played with my little cousin and how incredible the terrain and prop textures looked. I also mentioned how gorgeous Star Wars: Battlefront was when I played it with my cousin last year. He pointed me to this video, which is a detailed look at how DICE used photogrammetry techniques to create these incredibly crisp and unique textures.

Thought you guys might find it interesting to see how much we've progressed from Source...

 

[Fruity Snacks]

You don't have to look far to see how much engines have progressed from source.

... you really only need to look back like, 5-6 years to see the advancements.

BUT, photogrammetry is a more modern thing. Some people have been using it in VR to help create cheaper, more realistic worlds.

 

[Psy]

Photogrammetry is super cool, though it's somewhat impractical as it largely depends on the weather / lighting, which is never a good thing.

 

[Hyperion]

Photogrammetry is super cool, though it's somewhat impractical as it largely depends on the weather / lighting, which is never a good thing.

And then there is euclideon graphics

 

[seth]

You don't have to look far to see how much engines have progressed from source.

... you really only need to look back like, 5-6 years to see the advancements.

BUT, photogrammetry is a more modern thing. Some people have been using it in VR to help create cheaper, more realistic worlds.

Oh, I know. I just don't play very many AAA games running these new engines, so anytime I play stuff on my cousin's PS4 I'm always blown away by the details. Besides, I was really only specifying textures here.

 

[puxorb]

I love photogrammetry because it produces some of the most realistic visuals I've seen in a videogame.

The game is called 'The Vanishing of Ethan Carter'.

Models such as rocks, trees, or houses were laser-scanned and imported into an editor to limit the polycount, but a lot of the detail is preserved in the textures. This game has the best looking visuals I have ever seen, but the effect is ruined in some spots when viewing up close, and despite being an open world, the game is rather small but still requires about 10GB. If there were fully-detailed levels or a decent sized open-world, the game's file-size would probably be huge.

 

[Hyperion]

The thing in Ethan is that you can look trees as closely as you can and you still cant see polygons or blurred texture. Also in that second picture, the chipped paint on railing is so sharp.

Really the only spot where textures fail is cobblestone, it doesn't have the depth

 

[seth]

The thing in Ethan is that you can look trees as closely as you can and you still cant see polygons or blurred texture. Also in that second picture, the chipped paint on railing is so sharp.

Really the only spot where textures fail is cobblestone, it doesn't have the depth

That's where tessellation comes in, I'd imagine. There's a section near the middle of the video where they talk about how they used displacement tessellation on the terrain meshes to enhance the depth of rocks and stuff. Looks really cool.

Starts around 34:55.

 

[Pocket]

Tessellation is basically LOD in reverse, but automated, right? Like they make a mesh and then the GPU automatically breaks it up and smooths it out?

 

[Oatmeal]

So much know-how and nobody bothered to teach them how to make proper powerpoint presentations. Those texts just melt into the background images.

 

[MaccyF]

Tessellation is basically LOD in reverse, but automated, right? Like they make a mesh and then the GPU automatically breaks it up and smooths it out?

sort of, the gpu automatically subdivides and smooths, but you can also control elevation of the tessellated surface using a mask, as well as the density of tessellation in different areas.